The first political opinion poll since the collapse of Berlin’s ruling coalition has found AfD’s support to have risen by 1.5 percentage points (pps) to 19.5% of the electorate.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) remained on 15.5% support, while the other parties in the coalition – the Greens and the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP) – recorded 11.5% (up 1pp) and 5% (up 0.5 pp) respectively.

All the ruling parties and the AfD remain well behind the Christian Democratic Union-Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU) alliance, which leads the poll on 32.5%, up half a point.

Bild quoted the head of pollster Insa as saying the rise in AfD’s popularity could be attributed to two factors – the collapse of the governing coalition and the return of Donald Trump to the White House.

Meanwhile, in a popularity ranking of German politicians, Scholz came 19th out of 20, which Bild said could revive calls in the SDP for a new party leadership contest.

Germany’s governing coalition collapsed in early November after Scholz fired his finance minister, Christian Lindner, prompting hm to pull his FDP out of the alliance and leaving the remaining parties with a parliamentary minority.

The country is expected to hold early elections to the Bundestag in February, following a vote of confidence on December 16, which Scholz is widely expected to lose.